If businesses want to find out about their local voluntary sector, a good place to go is the local support and development organisation that serves their area. You can find your local one here. They will put you in touch with local charities and voluntary organisations that may be interested in partnering with you. If you are looking specifically for opportunities to volunteer, try your local volunteer centre. Some local support and development organisations also organise speed-dating type events.

Build on existing links

Local charities and SMES are both rooted in the community. Co-operation often emerges naturally as a result of being part of the local community. In many organisations, links have been made just by volunteers who know each other. If there is something the charity needs, someone will know someone who can do it or who works for a company that can.

Some tax benefits are available through volunteering time donated, as well as the tax efficiency of traditional giving. But much more can and should be done. If government is shrinking and business/charities are replacing services previously provided then government should provide some support and direction to organisations and reward those who deliver – particularly small entrepreneurs. The key to funding is impact – central government should look at how to measure this to ensure they are maximising the efficiency of funding.

Mutual benefit

Don't consider community action as just a "nice thing to do"; look at how working together can create mutual benefits. So often, businesses jump into social responsibility without realising the business benefits they can achieve. Some seem to lose their business "head" and feel that they shouldn't gain anything – when actually if it is a win-win situation, it is likely to be far more beneficial to wider society. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) sometimes kicks itself with its own brand – if the benefits aren't clear it will be the first to be chopped in times of cuts. Equfund is a good example of social responsibility (SR) – it is similar to CAF Venturesome, but on a smaller, more specific scale – and is a profitable business that is trying to rebuild communities.

Equality

Both partners must treat SR as an investment that you want a return on. The holy grail is where businesses, big and small, work with charities to create a business benefit, but also help the charity reach their social aim. Both parties need to recognise that they are on equal footing; they should be partners in the process. A company should not perceive itself as more important and a charity should not perceive itself as less important. A shift in perception of organisations is required. Both parties also need to realise that social progress and profit do not need to be separate. They can both be achieved, and in doing so will create a more sustainable approach to both business and charity.

Due to BITC's structure and experience in the sector, we have set programmes designed especially for charity groups. When they hear about them, they're amazed by the opportunities available for them and sometimes expect a scam. After the first project, however, we can work on creating a bespoke partnership between the company and the school/community group. The main issue is that these organisations don't know that we (or similar organisations) exist –it is a case of outreach work and communicating our work.

Employee volunteering

This is becoming more and more common, especially in large businesses and SMEs. We can also see a change in the type of activities that are undertaken – more and more volunteers are using their business skills to support community groups/social enterprises. For example, skills sharing, where a team dedicate a day to help a community group tackling a specific challenge, or employability days, where volunteers run workshops for pupils or people removed from the job market. This brings benefits to both sides and is a much more sustainable way of working together.

The community is usually happier to purchase services from businesses that engage with the wider community – this is the reputation value. Businesses can also reduce costs by accessing free services from the charity. For example, progression co-ordinators at Street League function as recruitment consultants for the placements on offer to our academy graduates. Other benefits include: staff development opportunities through volunteering; business networking; other charity specific benefits (for example, Street League get the academy's graduates to run football sessions in the local business district). Ethical investment and purchasing is another benefit – according to the Ethical Consumerism Report (2007), household expenditure on ethical goods and services has almost doubled in the past five years. Also, the EU and government are beginning to include CSR criteria into its purchasing strategies with CSR being treated as a qualifier for tendering to supply. The Department of Trade and Industry says that CSR is likely to become an important business issue for SMEs because large customers are creating pressure for responsible behaviour right back down to supply chain.

Practical support

Local and central government cannot give tax benefits or subsidies very easily right now, however, it can give practical support in the form of sustainability regulations, eg SR qualifications for public sector tendering or by allowing charities and businesses to form consortiums and tender for public sector contracts. What we can achieve at charity-SME level is an empowered club for social good, a movement of similarly interested entities that work together for a better society. Both local and central government need to facilitate interaction between the business and charity worlds. SMEs have a real chance to keep services and projects going by matching government funding and providing a service to the community. This may seem like a behaviour of big business but in fact the vital point for emphasis is that true entrepreneurs will find where these projects overlap with their objectives and therefore where their businesses can benefit from these investments.

Challenges

In Europe, businesses with a turnover of up to €50m (£42.5m) can be considered SME so it is difficult to design a one-fits-all strategy for SR. Most guidelines discuss CSR and the term itself acts as a barrier to the effective engagement of SMEs. The common themes that have emerged from the various definitions of CSR are sustainability and responsibility towards different stakeholders. Small businesses find these terms difficult to understand as they are more concerned with survival. The word "corporate" also alienates most SMEs. A different yet common challenge is the "what they want to do isn't what you want them to do" type of scenario. We already know that community involvement can be a tool to motivate employees and drive their morale. But there might be a gap between what you want to do as a business and what employees want to do as individuals. Skills-based volunteering, which has a positive impact on charities is increasing but there is still too much unskilled, one-off activity taking place. Volunteers need to understand the business vision behind community action – internal communication is very important. SMEs must engage with staff about the charities they want to support and how. This will get their buy-in and feed important inputs into the community action strategy.

The Institute of Fundraising have a code of practice for charities and businesses working together and there's my online guide to CSR for SMEs. It is based on talking to SMEs across the UK who were engaged in all different kinds of CSR. It takes a step-by-step approach, recognising that all businesses are different, even within the SME sector. It also contains case studies, which I think is a very important tool for SMEs.

Communication

Most of the obstacles to social responsibility are more perceived than real and SMEs can overcome many challenges with innovation. One thing SMEs find challenging is communicating their CSR – it just doesn't come naturally to many SMEs to shout about what they do. But failing to communicate properly means that SMEs won't necessarily realise the full benefits, and making connections with the right partners will be harder.

Advantages

SMEs have special characteristics that can actually give them advantages when approaching CSR. SMEs are flexible and can respond quickly to changing circumstances. For example, by rapidly taking advantage of new niche markets for products and services that incorporate social and/or environmental benefits in their value. SMEs are also creative, allowing for the development of innovative approaches to SR. Moreover, the owner/manager is at the heart of the business, can influence the values and culture of the company and champion CSR. SMEs are also less bureaucratic, which makes it easier to get the CSR message across and involve all employees; the benefits of SR may also be felt more immediately in an SME.

Frameworks

The first place to start with any community programme is to have a vision and values about who you want to impact and why. Without a framework from which to work it can often feel overwhelming for an SME to even start. A great starting point is looking at your company, the expertise you have and seeing how that can help in the community.

These are essential when engaging with SR. With the current economic climate we are in, SMEs are extremely time precious and they need to be flexible with clients/contracts – one week there might low workload and the following week might be all hands on deck. Also, on the whole, the individuals within an SME leading the engagement with a charity tend to be at a senior level and are therefore usually in an operational role. This is engagement is over and above their normal remit.

Facilitate introductions

We need to help SMEs and charities find each other. We could try a speed networking event – I know a number of organisations that already do this. To help SMEs set up relevant programmes we could provide templates and/or plug-and-play examples. They could take these easily put them in place themselves with the minimum time needed to set and run a programme.

Open communication

When approaching SMEs, you tend to be dealing with the decision-maker and, if a charity can get them on side, then they have a senior internal champion. However there is an issue with language and mutual understanding of outside pressures on both sides. The key is flexibility – the charity and the SME need to work together in an open manner with strong communication in both directions to help each party understand the pressures and changing circumstances.

It's interesting that SMEs are often more able to empathise with the smaller charities, as they can understand the challenges of having small teams who must accomplish lots of things – this gives SMEs an advantage over bigger companies. For example, a team project for an SME might be around 5-7 staff which is much more manageable for small charities than the bigger teams. The SMEs we have worked with have built long-term links and gradually increased their participation year on year.

Allignment

Ensure both the organisations involved are meeting key objectives by working together. Brokers can help support this through empowering both sides to be open about what they want out of the partnership and mediating ways to create complimentary objectives. For the charity it might be to gain expert support with areas where they have a skills gap; for the company it might be leadership development and broadening the staff's experience of working with new groups. It's helpful if there are synergies: for example, the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants has a very diverse workforce and a global network of members, so matching them with an organisation which supports migrants and refugees was a great way of celebrating the diversity of all involved. My suggestion to charities wishing to work with SMEs and also for SMEs wishing to embark on community work, is to start small and build upon it. Find organisations who are really local to you so that you can build long-term relationships and it is convenient for all parties.

Partnership is the key word here. SR should be a true two-way partnership rather than a one-way philanthropic exercise, which is fine up to a point but less sustainable and beneficial in the long run.

Growth

The transmission of values throughout the organisation is interesting and happens from both a top-down and bottom-up angle. For example, a group of employees from a local company, Trayport, wanted to get involved with the community. They started with a one-day wall painting exercise but through this convinced their senior management of the value of community involvement; one year on, the partnership between the company and the community organisation is still going strong.

Managing risk can be difficult but charities, even small ones, are often very good at this. For example, when working with Stockport Academy and other local schools, there need to be robust health and safety procedures in place, which can include CRB checks and checking ID for all visitors etc. SMEs should not consider the potential red tape an obstacle. Moreover, if you work with a broker, they will normally handle the paperwork for you so it's even less of a resource drain.

Existing action

Find ways of supporting employees with the charity/community work they may already be doing in their spare time. The SME can support their colleagues who already volunteer/fundraise/mentor in their spare time. SMEs can also encourage participating in national fundraising events to promote community spirit internally: for example, APS supported Movember. This was fun, fostered good feeling among colleagues and let employees know that the company is supportive of fundraising and charity ventures.